SIMILE IN AT FIRST SIGHT
NICHOLAS SPARKS’S NOVEL
A THESIS
Submitted to Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra
By :
ELSABAT LUMBANTORUAN
Registration Number 2113220010
ENGLISH AND LITERATURE DEPARTEMENT
FACULTY OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS
DECLARATION
Except where appropriately acknowledged, this thesis is my own work,
has been expressed in my own words and has not previously been submitted for
assesment.
I understand that this thesis my be screened electronically or otherwise for
plagiarism.
Medan, Agustus 2015
ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
First of all, the writer would like to express my deepest thanks and praise
to Jesus Christ, who gives spirit and strength, ability to complete this research as a
partial fullfillment of the requirements to obtain the S1 degree of Sarjana Sastra at
the English Department, Faculty of Languages and Arts, The State University of
Medan.
In finishing this thesis writer has been helped by many people, therefore in
this occasion she would extend her sincere and special thanks to:
Prof. Dr. H. Syawal Gultom, M.Pd., the Rector of State University of
Medan.
Dr. Isda Pramuniati, M.Hum., the Dean of Faculty of Languages and
Arts, State University of Medan, and Vice Dean I, Vice Dean II, Vice
Dean III, and all the Administrative Staff.
Prof. Dr. Hj. Sumarsih, M.Pd., the Head of English Department and her
Thesis Adviser, Dra. Meisuri, MA., the Secretary of English Department.
Syamsul Bahri, S.S., M.Hum., the Head of English Literature
Department and as her Thesis Examiner.
Prof. Dr. Busmin Gurning, M.Pd., as her Academic Adviser.
All Lecturersthroughout her Academic Years at the state university of
Medan who have shared their knowledge
Thanks to her amaze parents,Hilon Lumbantoruan and Ramli Lubis
who has patiently given moral, spiritual and financial support including
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Her beloved friends and all her classmates in English Literature A and B
2011
Her beloved Sisters And Brothers, thanks for all their care as long as this
thesis arrangement.
Her sweetest friends Swi Idayati Simanjuntak and Marta Lumban Batu,
thanks for all their support, love, for whole the time after finishing this
thesis.
Thanks to Mam Eis who helped in administration and support.
Medan , Agustus 2015
i
ABSTRACT
Lumbantoruan, Elsabat. Simile In At First Sight Nicholas Sparks’s Novel. A Thesis. English and Literature Department. Faculty of Language And Arts. State University of Medan. 2015
This study is concerned with simile in At First Sight novel. This study was conducted by using descriptive qualitative design as the research method. The objectives of this study were to find out the types of simile used based on Hassan
and Halliday’s theory and the reason for using simile in At First Sight novel. The
data of this research were 272 sentences signed with simile that occured in At
First Sight novel. The research findings were four types of simile, they were
“like” (119), “as if” (69), “as” (66), “as...as” (18), and five reasons were: to enhance all words by adding portrayal and original, offer personal experience and emotional hook, make the sentences more creatively and shorter, add great depth and imagery, and create a powerful mental pictures
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CHAPTER IIREVIEW OF LITERATURE ... 7
A. Theoretical Framework ... 7
1. Simile as a Figure of Speech ... 7
2. Advantages and Functions of simile ... 13
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B. Conceptual Framework ... 26
CHAPTER IIIRESEARCH METHODOLOGY ... 29
A. Research Design ... 29
B. Data and Sources of Data ... 29
C. Technique of Collecting Data ... 29
D. Technique of Data Analysis ... 30
CHAPTER IV DATA ANALYSIS, FINDING AND DISCUSSION ... 31
A. Data ... 31
B. Finding ... 38
C. Discussion ... 39
CHAPTER V CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION ... 41
A. Conclution ... 41
B. Suggestion ... 41
REFRENCES ... 42
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LIST OF TABLES
Table
vii
LIST OF APPENDICES
1
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
A. The Background of The Study
All people have a story in their life, it could be a romantic, tragic, comedy
story, and everything related to their experience could be a nice one. Eventhough,
the writer should understand about some steps in making them to be an interesting
story such as in novel. Story in novel interested the reader wants to read another
story because novel allure us. A novel is about the world, novels are social: they
are about people. Gill ( 2006 : 59 ) they are not about people in the way in which,
say a television documentary or an article in a magazine is about people. People in
novels are people, but they are not same the ones we meet everyday. They are
fictional; they have been made up.
Writing a good novel is not as easy as read it. Creating a novel is not as
easy making a notebook because the writer of the novel must be able to cover a
beautiful story and wonderful language in their work. Wonderful language relates
to create appropriate sentences, interesting and understandable. Language is able
to influence the way of people think, to speak about anything in their daily life,
that is why language can not separate from human’s life. In expressing something
like information, an opinion, suggestion, and to express anything, whether feeling
of angry, happy, nerveous, sorrow or many things could be expressed by using
language. Language present in human’s life it just like pin and yarn, related each
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Not only writing novel, all literature students also must read novel to
increase their insight in how creating beautiful language. Because its involving
words to build the content, and arrange them into sentences to express what writer
ideas or opinions.
The reason why choosing At First Sight novel as the object of this
research, caused this novel is one of Nicholas’s novel which had already
translated into fifty languages. This novel is able to influence the readers feeling
the story is vivid or looks like truly happened beside the readers. In fact, this case
happened because Nicholas could cover beautiful story in At First Sight’s novel
by playing all words used. There are opinions about this novel, first based on
BestsellerWorld.com says “highly recommended. Nicholas sparks can take a
simple plot and turn it into an excellent of art. The authors does an excellent job
of making the characters looks so real, and will keep you interpret what’s going to
happen.” Second is based on New Bern Sun-Journal (NC) says that “sheds light
on the quirks couples discover in each other, and the frustation can ensue. At First
Sight delves deeper still- into the more serious realities of life and love.” Other
reasons of choosing At First Sight novel, it caused the writer is one of world’s
bestselling author of love stories and one of the world’s most beloved storytellers.
He is also the one of a lot of writer who has sales figure over eighty five million
copies of his books.
Other reasons of choosing this novel is because the content telling about
love story happened nowadays. The novel have a lesson for us specially for
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unappropriate for indonesian culture. Knowing their culture could have free sex
without married, its not our culture. Directly, the contents gave us an
understanding about wrong relationship in love. All deeds in the novel describe
about life in New York. They need to struggle their love, because there a lot of
affliction from their parents and also friends. The end of the story telling us that
lexie was died and the baby was born without a nice mother, its so tragic. Adding
by Jeremy utterance, he did want the baby born. But, for long time finally he
accepted and keep the baby. It means the novel could be a lesson for us in loving
story and took the positive things and apply in daily life. The story love of this
novel reminds us about how to preserve our nature, culture. The important one is
Western’s culture different with Indonesian’s culture, their culture should not
imitate. Nowadays young generation accepted them and collide our culture. These
events broke our life and it must be improved to keep the fellow generations.
Simile investigated in At First Sight novel because the novel has a beatiful
story through sentences, and the writer able to cover all the words seems like
vivid. Schulze (2010) says that similes enhance a novel by adding effecting
portrayal and originality. Means simile has influence and role in At First Sight’s
novel. Simile needs to learn because simile will help us to explain things, to
express emotion, and to make your writing more vivid and entertaining.
Discovering fresh similes uses in our own writing also means discovering new
ways to look at our subjects. Similes can not only make our writing more
interesting but also help us to think more carefully about our subjects. Put another
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Investigating simile in At First Sight novel’s need previous study as the
reference to encourage insight about simile wherever they were applied, there are
three journals found related to this study.
First “Symbol, Metaphor, and Similes in Literature: A Case Study of
Animal Farm.” The aims of this study is to find out the effect of using figures of
speech on the writer style and addressee’s understanding. For this aim, these three
figures of speech were founded in the novel and their types were determined
according to Newmark’s ( 1988b).
Second, “Simile in English : From Description to Translation.” This study
aims to provide account of similes in English, which serves as the starting point
for an exploration of the problems they can pose when translated into Italian. This
study expressed some similes are complex and posing various types of problem.
To solve them needs translator to take into account factors, such as genre and
similes, after all are reaching we can translate it literally.
Third, “Like In Simile- A Relevance –Theoritic View.” Simile would be
metaphors were it not for the word like. Simile describing as an explicit
comparison between two things or actions. This papers examines the meaning of
5
All the previous studies above have different goal, thus this study also has
a proper purpose exactly investigating types of simile used and explain the reason
why Nicholas used simile into his novel. This research is different, every simile
applied in sentence try to express the character even from their emotion, their
ideas and else. So, understanding simile will help us to know what the character
means, did they feel angry or else.
B. The Problem of The Study
Research is done to know all imperfection of text or any else. All research
have different problems definitely, and need investigation to find out the answer.
Based on the background of study, the problems are:
1. what types of similes are used in At First Sight, Nicholas Sparks’s
novel?
2. what does Nicholas’s reasons to use similes in At First Sight novel?
C. The Scope of The Study
This study was limited on the use of simile in At First Sight novel based
on Hassan and Halliday in Sabiha (2013: 18) state that simile consist of: as,
as...as, like, as if, and as though.
D. The Objective of The Study
Related to the problem of the study above, the objectives of this study
were:
1. to find out types of simile used in At First Sight Novel.
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E. The Significant of The Study
This research is expected to be useful for:
1. For readers to compare two entities unlike, and this reseach will give
information and enrich their knowledge about simile and how is the
simile itself will apply in daily communication.
2. For further researcher, this research can be used as a reference for
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CHAPTER V
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION A. Conclusion
Based on the findings of this research, it was concluded that:
1. Four types of simile they were “like” (119), “as if ” (69), as (66),
“as...as” (18), and as though was not found in At First Sight novel
2. Five reasons of using simile in the novel they were :
a) to enhance all words by adding portrayal and original,
b) offer personal experience and emotional hook,
c) make the sentences more creatively and shorter,
d) add great depth and imagery, and to create a powerful mental
pictures
B. Suggestion
After doing this research, and finding the result, some suggestions are
forwarding as follow:
1. For readers, this research can be used to enrich knowledge about simile
and how is the simile itself will apply in daily communication, learning
simile is important like speaking in daily life, we don’t need to say too
much, or other explanations in longer because we make it simple in
simile. So, understanding simile needed by all people who wants to
encourage theirself to be competent.
2. For further researcher, this research can be used as a reference for
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REFERENCES
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Damon, Phillip. et al. 1966. Language Rhetoric And Style. New York: McGraw- Hill
Fadaee, Elaheh. 2011. Symbols, Metaphors And Similes In Literature: A Case
Study of “Animal Farm”,2(2), 19-27
Frederik, Juliana Tijaroh. 1988. English Poetry, An Introduction To Indonesian
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Gill, Richard. 2006. Mastering English Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
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Hussain. Rashid. Metaphors and Similes in Literature, 3(9), 1-2
Long, William J. 2003. English Literature. Delhi: A.I.T.B.S.
Pierini, Patrizia. 2007. Simile In English: From Description To Translation. 29,21-43.
Sabiha, Machene 2013. The Use of Simile in William Golding’s Novel Lord Of
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Stern, Josef. 2000. Metaphor in Context. London: Massachusetts institute of technology.
Thornley, G.C. and Gwyneth Roberts. 1984. An Outline Of English Literature.
London: Longman Group
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http://en.wikipedia the free encyclopedia.htm (accessed on March, 13rd, 2015 at 12.10 am)
(https://www.google.com/search?q=tasmanian+devil&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8) (accessed on May, 14th 2015 at 15.00 am)
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/grammar/british-grammar/as-if-and-as-though (accessed on June, 20th 2015 at 11.30 am)
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